Governor Bandaru Dattatraya has stressed upon developing awareness towards cleanliness with positive attitude. He said that this Abhiyan was directly related to tourism development and with increase in tourism activities, economic prosperity could be achieved.
The Governor was speaking on the occasion of Swachhta Abhiyan organized today by Municipal Corporation Shimla at Chaura Maidan.
The Governor himself took a broom and cleaned the area near Advanced Study along with the local residents and school children. He appreciated the efforts of the MC Shimla for organizing the event and participating in such an important social cause. He urged them to make it a routine activity and expand such activities in other areas as well.
Shri Dattatraya said that every citizen should be aware of his duty to keep his surroundings clean and stressed that cleanliness campaigns should be undertaken aggressively at all tourist places. He said that being a tourist state, it was extremely necessary to maintain proper cleanliness in the cities and towns so that the state could build a good image among the tourists.
He expressed happiness that as many as 1.96 crore tourists, including 4.70 lakh foreigners, visited the state in 2017. The maximum number of 1,62,168 foreign and 33,18,829 domestic tourists thronged Shimla. He said that these figures show that tourists were more attracted towards Shimla and it was our duty to keep this city clean and green so that the tourists carry with them the message of sweet memories and cleanliness. He said that people were aware of cleanliness in Himachal and he stressed on more such programmes of cleanliness should be organized on a large scale so that more people could join it.
Mayor Kusum Sadret welcomed the Governor on the occasion.
Commissioner, MC Shimla Pankaj Rai and students of Government High School Chaura Maidan, Totu and DAV school also participated in the cleanliness drive.
